Lover to Lover
by 99N
Summary: Toph goes undercover... and Sokka begs her not to.


_Road to Road, Bed to Bed, Lover to Lover, and Black to Red…_ the radio sang as Republic City's Chief of Police changed out of her police uniform into a Fire Nation crimson qipao hemmed with gold and set with rubies.

"Going out again?" Sokka asked, appearing in the doorway of her bedroom as she tied her hair up into Fire Nation style bun with a small golden flame of a crown. It was the sixth time this week he came over to help the Chief's daughter with her homework, read her stories, and practice sparring after he learned the girl's mother rarely came home from work except for during the hours of 7 and 9 AM most days.

"I have to," Toph insisted as she placed a pin into the decoration.

"What about Lin?" Sokka asked with a sigh. He had just gotten the five and a half year old to sleep after a rather eventful afternoon that included a play date across Yue Bay with the Avatar's youngest son, Sokka's nephew.

"The girl has you," Toph mumbled through gritted teeth as she held a ribbon in her mouth and prepared a couple of beads as charms for a bracelet of sorts. She changed the charm each time, and the ribbon size and length every time she went under cover so that none of the local patrons recognized her back again.

Sokka drew a deep breath and crossed the threshold of the room, closing the door behind him. If what he needed to say lead to an argument, the last thing he wanted was for their little girl asleep next door to be awoken by the people she loved most, fighting for her. "She needs her Mother, Toph."

Toph dropped a bead and cursed under her breath, slamming a flat hand on the stone table to generate enough vibrations to find the small brass piece again. "Well—Her mother is busy! Okay? There's a bloodbending crime boss on the lose as you are well aware, COUNCILMAN—So there is no point in playing with her or teaching her if—if he's out there and can just kidnap her or kill her or—worse and you KNOW I can't let that happen! I have to go—to find out something—to catch him!"

Sokka threw his hands in frustration. He learned long ago, grimacing wasn't physically expressive enough for his blind friend who relied so heavily on seismic sense to 'see' everything. "And you think _this_ will help? Going out? Getting sloshed? Sleeping around?" Sokka asked.

"In the same clubs that you-know-who and his cronies are known to frequent for pleasure AND for business! Maybe I could hear something useful!"

"Or maybe not!—Toph, we've been down this same avenue before!"

Toph leaned on her stone table that she used to hold her various accessories that she wore when she went undercover. Her mind raced with the possibilities. Part of her hated herself for not staying home at night but the other part of her convinced her what she was doing was right and necessary. She knew no one believed her, not Sugar Queen or Baldy, or Boomerang Guy, but her daughter was the most important thing in her life. That little girl, in the room just one door over, was scarcely older than five, just starting out on life. However, her child didn't have the fortune of being born to a mother and a father in a safe, peaceful, affluent village in the Southern Earth Kingdom as she did.

Instead, that little girl was born to a widow, in the heart of a grungy city filled with ever-quarreling leagues of ruffians all vying for territory, power and autonomy. And her Mother, was part of a team bound by fate to restore and try to maintain the peace that they had established twice before: thirteen years ago, and fifteen years ago, once from a greedy iron-miner, and the other time, from a genocidal Fire Lord. This time, the Mother was fighting a blood-bending crime boss who managed to talk his way after several arrests and hearings, but this time, they would not let him escape. He left too many bodies after his last raid, and too many witnesses who managed to somehow get away unscathed.

"Sokka…" Toph whispered, tears beading in her murky eyes, her voice trembling. "You know I have to feel like I am doing something… to stop it."

Sokka lowered his head in defeat. Despite being the chairman of the city's council, and able to sway even the most fervently opposed politicians to see his way, he still couldn't influence the City's Esteemed Chief of Police when she had her mind set on something. She was a force of nature, more stubborn than the mountains that only she could bend.

"Is there anything I can do to help you… work more efficiently, so hopefully, you can come home early?" Sokka asked hopefully.

Toph paused for a moment, bending a knee only slightly as if to sit, before standing again. To sit at a time like this, would be too much of a show of weakness. Even among those she considered good friends and almost family, she could not show so much vulnerability. "The contacts…" She croaked, finding her voice again. "and the make up… so that they think I can see," She added a little more firmly.

Sokka sighed and picked up her tray with the face paints. Toph only had two colors and like her clothes, they were black, and red.

* * *

He sat waiting, with a warm rag in hand, and a role of clean bandages just in case. He usually gave her until four in the morning to return before drifting off to sleep with an alarm set for seven to head back into City Hall for another day of council proceedings.

Just as his limit approached, he heard the front door opening. He rushed out to help his best friend into her room, where they could clean her up, bind whatever wounds she may have incurred, and erase the evident of her wild night without her innocent child possibly being exposed to the dark side.

"You're limping," Sokka whispered as he draped her arm over his shoulder.

Toph chuckled. "It's nothing." She said touching a split lip.

He raised the warm rag to her face and applied pressure, to stop the blood from dripping on the flooring. "Did they find out you're the chief?"

Toph let out a soft chuckle. "Nah, fuckers may be smart enough to thwart my beat cops, but not smart enough to recognize me." Sokka let out a sigh of relief. "I even asked them if they'd be able to recognize their greatest enemy if she walked through the doors of the Ivory Swing in a bullshat disguise and a golden hair thingy."

"And what did they say?" Sokka asked, trying to keep the conversation going, to distract his best friend from the pain she must have been in.

"Of course!" Toph laughed, before clutching her lower abdomen and grimacing in pain.

"Please… don't over exert yourself…" Sokka pleaded, resisting temptation to just carry her to her bedroom.

Toph scoffed. "What do you know about over exertion? You sit in a fancy chair in a fancy hall uttering fancy words all day?"

"I know what it is like to break an arm and a leg for a best friend, in a fight for a world that probably doesn't deserve half of what we give it, but still we give anyways," Sokka replied, pausing on their way to the master bedroom of the Chief's small flat in the heart of Republic City.

Toph hung her head, ashamed, remembering the day of Sozin's Comet. "I shouldn't have—" she whispered. It was a day she had tried so hard to forget: a day of feeling and fleeing from so much heat radiating from the fire, and then suffering from blindness and agonizing uncertainty as she clung to Sokka's broken arm, praying to whatever spirits there were that if they died, it would be together, and quickly.

"No, it's easy to forget something that we want to, I understand."

"No—its not…" Toph sighed, trying to push that day from her mind again. "I'm a horrible friend for taking advantage of you like this—for being so selfish and then chastising you about it—"

"Hey, you're not selfish. Spirits! You're the most selfless person I know, constantly giving your time, energy and body for the greater good! You just have to remember—that you're human. You only have one body, and there will come a day when that body will break. How then, can you help anybody? How then can you keep your daughter safe?" Sokka asked.

This time it was Toph who halted their trek to the master bedroom. Sokka was right, and she found it infuriating, as she always did, but also terrifying. She liked to pretend that she had no weaknesses, that she was the Greatest Earthbender in the World! That she was like another mountain, part of the landscape: stubborn, heavy, and invincible. But she was just another sack of blood and bone with some tissue keeping it all contained, just a body that could be bent, a body that could break…

"After you help me out of this wretched get up," Toph began to say, tugging at the collar of her qipao. "Will you stay?"

"If it is your desire, always."

…


End file.
